IRS Commissioner John Koskinen and House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT)

Members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee sent a lengthy letter to President Obama today demanding that IRS commissioner John Koskinen be removed from his position.

The Committee outlined its findings to date of their investigation of the IRS targeting scandal as reasons for why they felt Koskinen needed to be removed. The letter cited obstruction by Koskinen of Congressional investigations, failure to testify truthfully under oath, non-compliance with a subpoena, and failure to produce 24,000 emails pertinent to the investigation as some of the key reasons they feel he should be fired.

A copy of the Committee Members’ letter is included below.

Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) said in a statement that the IRS failed to preserve agency records despite a subpoena, noting that 24,000 emails were destroyed that were pertinent to the Lois Lerner investigation after they were under the subpoena and also despite the IRS Chief Technology Officer issued a preservation notice ordering employees not to destroy anything.

Chaffetz added:

Mr. Koskinen failed in his duty to preserve and produce documentation to this Committee. The IRS failed to comply with a congressional subpoena. The IRS further failed by making false statements to Congress. We will pursue all constitutional remedies at our disposal, including potential contempt proceedings or perhaps impeachment of Commissioner Koskinen.

At best, Commissioner Koskinen was derelict in his duties to preserve agency records. At worst, he and the IRS engaged in an orchestrated plan to hide information from Congress. Given Commissioner Koskinen’s obfuscation and misleading statements to Congress, and the false claims that key evidence was permanently destroyed, the result has been an unnecessarily protracted investigation. More importantly though, the American people will never know all the facts surrounding the agency’s targeting of conservative tax-exempt 501(c)(4) groups. This is an unacceptable outcome and one that demands those responsible be held accountable.

The Committee Members’ request to remove Koskinen comes just a short time after Republican lawmakers called for former OPM director Katherine Archuleta to be fired in the wake of the two data breaches at that agency that impacted the personal data of over 20 million current and former federal employees. Archuleta ultimately resigned her position.